UPDATE 2/4/05: Looks like while I was gone The BRAD BLOG received another (our fourth) Koufax Award nomination. This time for Best Series (Clint Curtis: Whistleblower Affidavit). And I admit to being quite proud of that particular recognition! So we'll move this item back up to the top for a short while and again ask for your support by casting a vote for our "Clint Curtis" series by a leaving a comment in support of same at the aforementioned link. Looks like this nomination was announced well over a week ago while I was gone, so BRADBLOGGERS will have some voting/catching-up to do! Please drop by and give us a vote! For that one, and the others --- see below --- if you haven't already! (Yes, I'm finally back in town as of this morning, but have so much catch up work now to do, I probably won't be able to begin blogging again until Monday...unless I just can't help myself. Also...I'm not sure, but these votes may be just the semi-finalist voting, so I may have to debase myself yet again in the future to beg for your votes if we make it to the "finals". But we've long ago cast off all illusions of self-respect, so why worry about such things now?) - BF

UPDATE 1/12/05: Wow, embarrassment of riches. BRAD BLOG just nominated for yet another Koufax award category! This time, "Most Deserving of Wider Recognition". If you are inclined to vote for us (and thanks to those who already have in the other categories!) you may do so via the just added link to the third category in the list below. Bumping this item temporarily back up to the top, long enough to catch your attention! And thanks for all the exceedingly nice words in many of your votes! - BF

Looks like The BRAD BLOG has been nominated in (so far) twothree different categories for The Koufax Awards!

Please feel free to put a vote for us by leaving a comment with "BRAD BLOG" in it, at the following nomination page links!:

More nominations for other categories are still to come. Keep an eye out at the Wampum blog (Home of the Koufax Awards), and feel free to shout out if you notice that we have been nominated in any other categories as they continue to announce them!

We've been working hard to get things in order to help put much of your discussion here, into action over at Velvet Revolution!

We've still got much work to do over there, but now we need you on board to help!

Grab your pitchfork and light your torches! We are officially open for business!

Stop on by, sign-up as a founding Velvet Revolutionary, jump into the Discussion forums, and let's take all of the energy, patriotism, civic-mindedness and hope for a better America and turn it into action and mobilization for the cause!

It was Velvet Revolutions that so effectively overturned despotic regimes through peaceful civil disobedience in places like the former Soviet Union, East Germany, Czchekoslovakia, Poland, South Africa, and of course...most recently...Ukraine.

In all of those places, the citizenry rose up to take matters into their own hands to demand that their governments be held responsible. Now it is our turn to learn from those countries what it really means to have a government of the people, by the people, and for the people!

I've posted more information over there about why we feel that Velvet Revolution has become necessary in the United States. And there will be more information and mobilization of a hopefully great citizen's brigade in the days, weeks, months and even years ahead!

Join us! It's yourVelvet Revolution! We've just made it possible for everyone to come together in one place! But without you...we're nothing! Please lend a hand, volunteer, organize, share your ideas and thoughts, and come on board in every way possible!

For a start, we need you to spread the word high and low about VR and take it upon yourself to make things happen there! We have several more affilliate groups coming on board shortly, and our hope is to bring all such groups together for our common goals.

Velvet Revolution is Issue BasednotParty Based and we hope to focus like a laser on a few issues of great importance to our democracy while lending our support and strengths to smaller groups who are working on aspects of those same issues. See the "ABOUT" link at VR for more details...

And as an added plus...If you guys help take this ball and run with it, perhaps I'll soon be freed up a bit more here so that I'll have more time again on The BRAD BLOG to keep causing trouble for the bad guys...I can't do all the heavy-lifting you know!

I expect there to be many bumps in the road ahead. We'll do our best to smooth them out as we move forward. Revolutions can be messy.

More dirt from Florida Elections...This from AP (includes an alleged Democrat wrongdoer as well, so little wonder it makes it to the wires):

A campaign consultant said he was hired by several Florida politicians over the past seven years to gather absentee ballots during their elections, a violation of state law.

Ezzie Thomas, who has been granted immunity, told prosecutors that he was paid numerous times since 1998 to gather absentee ballots, most recently by Orlando Mayor Buddy Dyer's campaign last year, his attorney said Friday. (ed. Note: Dyer's a Democrat)

Thomas told prosecutors four months ago that he was hired to do similar work for U.S. Sen. Mel Martinez (ed. Note: Republican) when he ran for Orange County chairman in 1998, Florida Secretary of State Glenda Hood's (ed. Note: Republican) 2000 campaign for Orlando mayor, and two other minor campaigns.

How filthy is the "Sunshine State", anyway?! Doesn't anybody down there just run for office and when/if more voters vote for them than the other guy/gal they can be the winner?

Or is my naiveté showing again?

And of course...we wonder if Mr. Thomas may have also worked with any other less-than-forthright, less-than-upstanding Republican Florida Politicians who we've been keeping our eye on of late...

Too tired, too busy...too exhausted for proper analysis. So I point you to someone with a better brain than I for the moment.

From The Editors at The Poor Man...a few days ago...when there were a dozen or so more living U.S. Troops in Iraq.

The entire article seems particularly germaine given some of the appalling discussion I've seen from the wingnuts in BRAD BLOG comments of late...The insurgency continues to grow in Iraq...

Understand that the people killing us in Iraq aren't motivated by Gore Vidal or inspired by Susan Sontag or organized by Michael Moore or in cahoots in any way with any of the right's celebrity pińatas - not literally, not metaphorically, not if you look at it in a certain way, not to any infinitesimal degree, not in any sense, not in any way at all.
...
And if you really want to help the American war effort, you can join the fucking armed forces and go to Iraq like thousands of others have, and then you can do the best job you can to show them that Americans care about them and want, above all else, for all of our futures to be better and more peaceful than the past, and get paid shit. You will then be my personal hero, really, and I hope you don't get killed or maimed or see or do something that makes you hate everything for the rest of your life, which is a very real possibility.

In other related news that you probably haven't heard much about...

According to AP, "An Army platoon sergeant who ordered his soldiers to throw Iraqis into the Tigris River was sentenced Saturday to six months in military prison, but will not be discharged."

From Reuters, "The U.S. military said on Saturday a bomb dropped by one of its planes during a mission in northern Iraq hit the wrong target and it 'deeply regrets the loss of possibly innocent lives.'" (We're wondering what makes the 14 civilians killed when we bombed the wrong house --- many of whom were woman and children --- just "possibly" innocent).

And again from AP, "As of Saturday, Jan. 8, 2005, at least 1,351 members of the U.S. military have died since the beginning of the Iraq war in March 2003."

Which brings us nicely back once again to the final graf from The Poor Man article...With apologies to anyone who may have been offended by the language around here of late, the final graf hits the nail on it's head...

And, before you ask: no, I have no clue about how we can improve things in Iraq. I don't have a single idea for how we can un-shit the bed, and I don't hold out much hope that this whole bed-shitting episode is ever going to be brought to a lemony-fresh conclusion. I do, however, know who shit the bed, and have some sense of how frequently he shits there. Let's stop shitting for a start.

The Pennsylvania Department of State will open an examination of electronic voting system problems that plagued balloting in three counties and led to the resignation of an election director, agency officials said.

Voters using the new machines in Mercer, Greene and Beaver counties on Nov. 2 complained that their votes were voided when they tried to review their choices, which led to long lines at some balloting locations.

Eight counties used the same machines made by UniLect, based in Dublin, Calif., but the voting difficulties were limited to the three counties in Western Pennsylvania.

What is it about "The Rule of Law" that these Republicans just can't seem to keep straight?

The letter which Ohio's Secretary of State, J. Kenneth Blackwell (supervisor of fair and free elections in Ohio, as well as Ohio Co-Chair of the Bush/Cheney Re-Elect Committee) apparently asked supporters for illegal corporate donations, according to AP:

The state's chief elections officer, accused of mishandling the presidential vote in Ohio, sent a fund-raising letter for his own 2006 gubernatorial campaign that was accompanied by a request for illegal contributions.

A pledge card with the letter from Secretary of State Kenneth Blackwell, a Republican who co-chaired the Bush-Cheney election campaign in Ohio, said "corporate & personal checks are welcome."

Corporate donations are illegal in Ohio.

As we reported earlier in the week, the letter in which Blackwell takes credit for "helping deliver the great Buckeye State for George W. Bush" along with hitting every Christopublican Hotbutton Phrase in the Karl Rove "How to Win Elections and Influence Gullible Americans" handbook, was created to raise funds for Blackwell's gubernatorial bid even while recounts in Ohio were still ongoing. (We have recently updated that original report to include the text of the entire letter, by the way).

Then there is the matter of the official-looking letterhead used in the fundraising letter (the outside envelope refers to him, apparently without irony, as "The Honorable Ken Blackwell"):

While we're fairly certain that the use of official letterhead to raise funds for an upcoming campaign would be a no-no, we're not certain about the use of this official-ish letterhead, and the official-ish looking version of the Great Seal of the United States along with it.

We had hoped to look into the requirements for the legal use of the Great Seal this week until several items distracted us. Amongst them, live coverage of only the second time in well over one-hundred years that an arcane Constitutional provisional had to be invoked in Congress, thanks to Mr. Honorable's Ohio Election calamity, and, of course, the business of final preparations for America's Velvet Revolution which we hope to officially get underway on Monday.

In the meantime, we welcome any thoughts, research or other contributions via comments here on the letterhead matter from any of you crime-hating freedom-lovers out there on the Internets. Crime-justifying, GOP-apologists need not apply.

UPDATE: It should be noted that the letter reported on by AP, included in the Democratic House Judiciary Committee's 102-Page report of evidence suggesting fraud and/or malfeasance in Ohio's election, and blown up for use behind Sen. Frank Lautenberg (D-NJ) during his speech last Thursday in the historic Congressional debate on the Ohio Electoral challenge was originally discovered and reported by RAW STORY.

AP chose not to give the Internet-only News Source the proper credit for their excellent original reporting. The reasons for that we will leave to the reader to discern. We don't wish to make the same mistake ourselves, however. We linked to them in our original story on the matter several times, but should have credited their hard work in this report as well!

Travel took longer than expected. Much. (Who said it never rains in Southern California?!)

So...much catchup to do over the weekend, I guess. Along with preparations for the revolution. (Anyone have a pitchfork or torch I can borrow? I wanna look my best for the opening!)

So to that end, apologies for a quiet day today (not that you guys were quiet! Which is just fine by me!), and a potentially quiet-ish weekend while we take care of various pieces of related business. We'll see how it goes.

But this is mostly just a quick note to say that I had the 11pm PT repeat of Hannity & Colmes on just now in the background when Republican Ed Rollins, apologizing for Americans committing torture or something says, "It's all bullshit."

Yes..."Bullshit"! On the Fox "News" Channel!

I, for one, am outraged and offended! Has Fox no moral or family values?! I could have been watching that at 6pm PT with my young daughter! If I had one!

And while such a thing can happen on live TV (though we'd expect it would get snuffed out in the delay), this was the 11pm PT repeat! And it wasn't even bleeped out before the second airing!

Hannity didn't even say a word about it. Just went on with his harranguing of the Democratic guest as usual!

It's almost like these guys say one thing, and then do another or something!

Will be on the road for a few hours today, so won't be able to post much until a bit later today/tonight...

Have a number of things in the works. Amongst them, a Velvet Revolution - Dedicated to all the BRAD BLOG readers of the world, and the like-minded individuals who have taken the cause of preserving democracy into their own hands. Count on nobody but yourself.

I've gotten much email over the last 24 hours or so (not to mention the last month or two!), so I beg your patience while waiting on replies, and forgiveness for those which I have just been unable to reply to for any number of reasons. I do my best to always reply, but recognize that I don't always suceed in that effort. (I also do my best to read all comments, even if I'm sometimes slow to get to them all, and can't always answer them.)

Or use this as an Open Thread to chat your hearts out. But seriously...get some rest and find some peace. There is much muckraking to come in the days, weeks, months and years ahead...And we're gonna need a bigger rake.

Number of American Cable "News" Networks Who Carried Today's Historic Proceedings: 0

U.S. Troops Killed in Iraq During Today's Joint Session of Congress: 7
U.S. Troops Killed in Iraq During George W. Bush's "Presidency": (*) 1,349
Iraqi Civilians Killed by U.S. Forces During George W. Bush's "Presidency": 100,000+
WMD's Found So Far in Iraq: 0

...Missions Accomplished...

(*) Includes only those troops who died while still within Iraq's airspace.

Moments ago, in the joint session of Congress, the Electors from the state of Ohio were formally challenged by Rep. Stephanie Tubbs-Jones of Ohio and Senator Barbara Boxer of California...

Dick Cheney, presiding over joint session: "The two houses will withdraw from the chamber and will deliberate separately and report back after Debate."

All cable "news" nets...Even Fox...now covering... (Though Fox's Major Garrett incorrectly informs us that "all 88 counties were fully recounted" and adds other apologies on behalf of the Republican Party.)

...MORE...

Most "news" nets back to commercials and occassional coverage. C-SPAN carries full coverage. Tubbs-Jones speaking now...

...CONTINUING...LIVE BLOGGING IN LIEU OF COVERAGE BY "NEWS" NETWORKS...

Rep. Deborah Pryce (R-OH) quotes Kerry's concession speech. Says, "Their challenges is no more than an excercise to obstruct, destroy and divide..." FIRST MENTION of "Conspiracy Theories"! And "Michael Moore" as a bonus!

Rep. John Conyers (D-MI) asks and receives unaminous consent request to include the full 102-page report, "Preserving Democracy: What Went Wrong in Ohio?" into the record. Is speaking now..."Not a single official in Ohio has given us an explanation for the many irregularities in Ohio...Read the full report on our website..."

Flipping back and forth between House Hearings (on C-SPAN) and Senate Hearings (on C-SPAN2)...Both live streaming at C-SPAN.org...

..."Attny Jimmo" --- a BRAD BLOG commenter/troll --- is thoroughly discredited today and any credibility (if any existed in the first place) for the Freeper is lost....His Tuesday comment, "What are you going to drum up on Friday, the day after ZERO Senators and ONE nutty Representative challenge the electoral votes?" and Wednesday's comment, "After you get cold shouldered tomorrow by the Democrats; you are welcome to join us in the light of the GOP"...demonstrate "Jimmo's" lack of knowledge on, well...anything...that dispute, if there was one, is now over...

In Senate...Durbin and Kennedy speak in support of Tubbs-Jones/Boxer challenge...

According to several sources, Jesse Jackson has just announced six Senators who will join in challenging the Electors today in a joint session of Congress. His announcement was made to a rally going on at this hour in Lafayette Park across from the White House.

Jackson told the crowd that Senator Barbara Boxer will stand to challenge, and will be supported by at least the following Democratic Senators: Hilary Clinton (NY), Harry Ried (NV), Barack Obama (IL), Dick Durbin (IL) and Christopher Dodd (CT).

Jackson's statement was just confirmed by The BRAD BLOG with a second source. A representative from Rainbow/PUSH and an aide to Rev. Jackson who spoke to us by cellphone moments ago as Jackson could be heard in the background speaking to reporters has confirmed that Jackson announced Sen. Barbara Boxer will stand and make the challenge, and will be supported by at least a half a dozen Senators.

"When they convene for the debate," he told us, "at least a half dozen if not more will speak about the irregularities and the need for Election reform. Boxer herself will raise the challenge."

He confirmed the Senators named above and suggests that people continue to send in Email and phonecalls asking Senators to stand up.

MORE...

AP is confirming that Boxer "and a small group of Democrats" will challenge.

It would be only the second time since 1877 that the House and Senate were forced into separate meetings to consider electoral votes.

Sen. Barbara Boxer, D-Calif., signed a challenge mounted by House Democrats to Ohio's 20 electoral votes, which put Bush over the top. By law, a protest signed by members of the House and Senate requires both chambers to meet separately for up to two hours to consider it. Lawmakers are allowed to speak for no more than five minutes each.

"I have concluded that objecting to the electoral votes from Ohio is the only immediate way to bring these issues to light by allowing you to have a two-hour debate to let the American people know the facts surrounding Ohio's election," Boxer wrote in a letter to Rep. Stephanie Tubbs Jones, D-Ohio, a leader of the Democratic effort.

And the White House seems prepared to keep their "conspiracy theorist" defense firmly in place. We'll expect to hear the following language, as reported by AP repeated quite frequently as the day goes on...

"I think the American people expect members of Congress to work together and move forward on the real priorities facing this country, instead of engaging in conspiracy theories and rehashing issues that were settled long ago," McClellan said.

If you can't beat 'em, slime 'em...

MORE FROM BOXER'S PRESS CONFERENCE...

Senator Boxer: "It's not about overturning the election. For me, this is the opening round in the call for Electoral Justice."

Some good old fashioned rumormongering...We figure if folks are gonna accuse us of it, we may as well take part in some every now and again.

Clint Curtis, along with an activist, an FDA statistician and a former White House employee went from Senate office to Senate office today meeting with staffers in hopes of raising their awareness about all that has gone on and been learned since November 3rd about the disintigrating state of our democracy.

We are told that they were welcomed into every office, and Clint Curtis, in particular, caused a bit of a stir amongst the various staffers who were well-familiar with his story (several even mentioning that they had been following it on The BRAD BLOG we're happy to report!) A list of most of the visited offices can be seen in this post from earlier today.

Ted Kennedy's office, in particular, we are told, took an interest in speaking to Curtis. Arranging for Kennedy's legal team to speak with him when they heard he was there.

We received the same message from several different sources. Namely, that all day the phones never stopped ringing in every single office visited. All phone banks were overwhelmed, and the moment anyone would hang up the phone, it would ring immediately again.

The message is being sent loud and clear. Your voices are being heard! Though don't stop now! It ain't over till it's over.

The calls were overwhelmingly (one source even said 100%) in support of challenging the electors tomorrow. Senate staffers reported never having seen anything like it! Especially with so many calls being overwhelmingly in favor of only one side of an issue. "Thousands...thousands...non-stop!" said one Senate staffer.

On that point, the Internets are abuzz tonight with rumors that Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-CA) will be indeed be standing up to challenge the Electors. See RAW STORY for more healthy, up-to-date, rumormongering links on that and the reports that she will be holding her cards close to her vest for as long as possible.

Earlier we reported that attempts for at least three hours today to reach her offices in both D.C. and Los Angeles were all met with busy signals until we were finally able to get through to her San Diego office which reported a tally of 250 calls FOR and only 10 AGAINST. (We didn't even know "Attny Jim" could do 10 different convincing voices! Inside joke for BRAD BLOG comment readers.)

And we've heard stories, from various sources, speculating that there will be anywhere from one Senator to eight who come forward tomorrow. Then again, there could be none, and since only one is necessary for a debate on the matter to take place in both Houses of Congress, we'll wait and see what happens tomorrow. But signs do look positive at this hour.

We have heard that there was a hard coalition of three Senators in support of challenging the Electors, while a larger number had hoped to simply publish a letter calling for Election Reform instead of taking the more impressive stand as recommended by the Constitution. There is a reason why in a body of hundreds, only two are required to immediately halt all proceedings in order to debate and investigate any Electoral chicanery.

While Election Reform is clearly necessary, that can be done next week, or next month. Tomorrow is the moment for Senators to stand up with the 24 House of Representative members to challenge Electors for being illegally seated.

We're happy to report we've heard that the three Senators in favor of challenge held strong, at least for the day, and did not fold in favor of the "Letter" option.

There has also been discussion today of challenging the Electors of at least three different states! (Ohio, Florida and New Mexico being the front-runners in the rumormill department)

A challenge to the Electors of three different states would force three different debates on the matter, and likely bump the whole thing into a second news cycle (at least) as one source mentioned to us...Which, we believe, would also be a very good thing.

But do we ask too much?

Perhaps...But asking too much has gotten us this far, so why stop now?

Keep up the good work, Freedom Fighters. We'll see you (and C-SPAN) in the morning...The festivities, rumor has it, begin at 1pm ET (10am PT for you Liberal Hollywood Elitists).

Clint Curtis was LIVE (11pm ET time) on "Fox News Live with Alan Colmes" on the Fox News RADIO Network.

I was able to capture the live stream, and am I'm trying to remove the commercials from the recording to make the bandwidth demand less when posting it for you folks to listen to.

Colmes gave Curtis a good (and very tough) grilling! Happy to hear it! And I think he stood up well to the questioning. I heard no inconsistencies in his story.

I've turned off comments on this item, so that all comments can be consolidated on the original item on this, found here. I'll also post a link to the interview at that item as soon as I can get it posted.